SAO PAULO, March 17, 2026, 15:58 BRT
XRP hovered around $1.54 Tuesday, having briefly hit $1.60 late Monday—the strongest level it’s seen in a month. That was just enough to push it ahead of BNB, putting XRP back in the number four slot among cryptocurrencies by market cap.
The timing is tricky for crypto. Bitcoin hovered close to $74,700, with ether at $2,337, as traders juggled the Federal Reserve policy meeting kickoff and nagging inflation fears—higher oil and Middle East tensions feeding both. That cocktail has boosted big tokens, but nerves remain.
Ripple dropped a new headline Tuesday: the company plans to roll out payments, custody, prime brokerage, and treasury services in Brazil. It’s also filing for a VASP license—a must-have for crypto providers—with the Central Bank of Brazil. “Latin America has always been a priority market for Ripple,” President Monica Long said. Ripple
Derivatives traders are taking bigger swings, too. XRP open interest stands at roughly $2.86 billion, according to CoinGlass. Binance’s open interest, reported by CoinDesk, hit 353.49 million XRP—nearing a five-month high.
Spot action ran hot as well. CoinMarketCap pegged XRP’s daily turnover north of $5.1 billion, market cap coming in at about $94.1 billion—just nudging past BNB, which sat near $91.8 billion. That minor lead was enough to bump XRP up among the market’s top ranks, though prices stayed closely packed.
XRP, the token associated with Ripple Labs’ payments arm, saw a bit of relief last year as the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission decided not to move forward with its appeal of the 2023 decision stating that XRP sales on public exchanges don’t qualify as securities.
But the rally’s foundation looks shaky. On Tuesday, Citigroup trimmed its 12-month bitcoin and ether targets, pointing to stalled U.S. crypto bills that, they say, shrink the opportunity for regulatory shifts to bring in bigger institutional players. “Regulatory catalysts will drive further adoption and flows,” strategist Alex Saunders wrote, though he flagged a legislative calendar that’s running out of space. Reuters
If the Fed sticks to a hawkish tone and oil prices keep stoking inflation concerns, there’s a real risk of leveraged crypto trades snapping back fast. XRP is hanging on near $1.50 and still sits ahead of BNB for now. The challenge: can it keep that edge with futures markets crowded and macro conditions that can shift without warning?
